York

Lovely old medieval walled city

Clifford's TowerThe Blue Bridge, close to our hotel (the Novotel)


Along the river OuseA walk along the town wall of York


One of the gates along the town wall


Kenny's soap carving at the York Museum


At the Multangular Tower, which dates from Roman times


Lots of people seemed to live on these narrow canal boatsA view of York Minster from the town walls. It turns out, this same view is the one that shows up in Google Maps when you look up York.


On a walk back home from Aldi, I saw this unusual utility tower


At Castle Howard, a "county house" (palace) near York


They had really good guides, who were happy to answer any questions you had. Eric spent hours talking to them. The kids were happier playing "Crossy Road" on my phone.An old fashioned folding desk




Walking around the grounds - a little drizzly, but not too badThey had a really amazing adventure playground






More of the grounds - truly some beautiful walks






They had trenches like this, so you could look out over the grounds, and have the illusion that there were no walls


A time capsule, to be opened in 2000 years!






A close-up of the bridge to nowhere - built as a folly


In the vegetable and flower gardens


Peter wearing his new shows - the old ones were pretty ratty lookingIn the Rambles area of York


A church, repurposed into a senior center - St. Sampsons Centre for the Over 60'sYork Minster cathedral


Great views from the towerYou can see part of the town wall


We stopped to have a traditional English Tea. I was very overstuffed after eating. It was weird - when we asked for the leftovers, they had us sign a paper agreeing that we were taking them at our own risk. I've NEVER had to do anything like that before.


It seemed that about 95% of the houses we saw in England were of brick, very similar to these. It got a little boring after a while.


We took a daytrip to hike around the North York Moors National Park - Hole of Horcam. Unfortunately the weather was very rainy - we got soaked, and since we were wearing jeans, it was pretty uncomfortable.In the distance we could see a weird building which a volunteer ranger told us was a radar installation


Just after a heavy rain, which soaked us.Eric is not happy about getting wet.




Heading towards a deserted hutAt the Beamish Open Air Museum, south of Newcastle. They had lots of guides that hey knew.


Making rag rugsAn "nice" home from around the 1900's


The outhouse. According to the guides, it was a big improvement over shared outhousesThe schoolroom, with some tiny benches and tables


Kenny had fun trying to run with the hoopsThe Fish and Chips restaurant at Beamish - very authentic, everything was done by hand the old-fashioned way. However, it was extremely slow!


A view from the coal towerAn old excursion train - these were used for transport with Beamish, which was huge


We rode on the Steam Elephant - one of the earliest steam engines


A bedroom in one of the old houses


Coffin shaped bathtub


At the village bakery, making everything the old fashioned way. Again, very slow - it smelled wonderful, but I didn't want to wait in line.


In the children's room of the "upper class" house.I was surprised that the resource center (where they kept artifacts) was open.




At the 1940's farmhouse


This was an air raid shelter, to protect from shrapnel